The words hit harder than everything else combined.
“Still.”
I close my eyes. She’s right. That’s the part I never got over.
Because forgiving someone doesn’t stop them from choosing something you can’t follow them into.
Chapter
Eighteen
SLOANE
The room feels smaller now. It isn’t because of the storm. Or the fire burning too hot. It’s not the walls closing tight around us beneath the weight of rain and memory.
Because the truth takes up space. And now there’s too much of it in here.
Neither of us speaks.
Thunder rolls somewhere deeper in the mountains, farther away than before. The storm is finally moving east, but the cabin still trembles occasionally beneath the heavy wind.
Rhys stands near the window with his back partly turned toward me. He doesn’t move. No signs of leaving, but not staying either. Just existing in that terrible middle ground he seems to live in.
I stare at him across the dim room and try to force my thoughts into some recognizable shape.
Phoenix chose this—not death, not necessarily—but the risk. The mission. Whatever waited inside that building badly enough to leave formation and walk into exposure.
And Rhys.
God.
Rhys didn’t abandon him. The realization sits heavy and ugly inside my chest because I built so much of myself around believing otherwise.
The anger. The investigation. My obsession. All of it pointed toward one simple truth. Someone failed my brother. Now nothing feels simple anymore.
Rain taps softly against the window. The fire cracks low behind me.
Rhys still hasn’t looked directly at me since finishing the story. Maybe because he thinks I hate him now. Maybe because part of him still hates himself. I don’t know which possibility hurts more.
My throat feels raw from holding too many things inside at once. “He really thought it mattered,” I say quietly. I close the distance, resting my hand on his shoulder.
He tightens almost imperceptibly. “Yes.”
One word. No hesitation. That certainty destroys something in me all over again. Because Rhys trusted him. Maybe not in the moment. But somewhere before that, he wouldn’t let go.
My thumb slides against his neck, letting him know I’m here. He doesn’t pull away. Doesn’t acknowledge me either. The air feels electric, more than any lightning.
He catches my wrist, rubbing my pulse point.
Like two people tethered together, though they shouldn’t be. I don’t know what this is between us. But I need to touch him, feel him in some way. He glances up, then, and I see the same hunger behind his eyes.
Phoenix would hate this.
But really? Would he?
I don’t know. All I know is he’s gone, and we’re both here trying to sort out why. Maybe that’s what tethers us together now.
He brings my hand to his mouth slowly. His lips brush over my knuckles like this matters.
